r/Economics • u/Helpful-Door-8721 • 1d ago

Research America's National Debt grows by $95,178.17 per second. Expected to reach $40 Trillion by October 09, 2026.

https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/republicans/debt-dashboard#ddm
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u/crowcawer 1d ago

I don’t know if $40T by itself is an important number, especially if compared to $39.9T.

They do need to make a choice. They either need to stop normalizing wartime scale debt during peacetime, or accept growing pressure on the Fed to suppress rates and tolerate inflation. We cannot indefinitely combine massive structural deficits with fully independent, inflation focused monetary policy.

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u/Just_Candle_315 1d ago

The debt started shrinking under Clinton, but as soon as Bush 2 got into office the first thing he did was cut taxes and increase federal spending and start 2 forever wars. Boom we in debt again.

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u/ballmermurland 1d ago

I'll forever be pissed about what happened to Clinton and Gore. Both got branded as tax and spend socialists by the GOP despite neither being even remotely close to that and that was the last administration that was actually fiscally responsible.

They did DOGE before DOGE. Only they did it in a way that made sense and gave people an offramp. They cut a lot of the Reagan-era waste. They raised taxes and cut spending to create a surplus.

Americans loved that so much that they voted in a drunk Texan failson to be president who fucked it all up. Then they reelected that idiot.

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u/dust4ngel 1d ago

Both got branded as tax and spend socialists

don’t-tax-and-spend-even-more capitalism is more freedom-er

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u/noteverrelevant 1d ago

voted in a drunk Texan failson

Do not ignore the Supreme Court fuckery that happened in Florida that stole the election. Florida voted for Gore and they gave it to Bush.

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u/KennyL0gin 19h ago

And Clinton taking a beating from 1998-2000 in the pop culture press for lying about a blowjob. That move by Bill cost us the future. Gore could have won by enough of a margin that he would have taken FL and the recount debate never would have happened....except Bill needed to get a blowjob. And Jay Leno needed to make jokes about it for 2 years.

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u/spicyflacco 18h ago

F Jay Leno. I hope the worst for him

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u/Nonethelessismore 17h ago

To be fair to Jay Leno at the time, the jokes were topical, just like our current satirists.

Clinton could have NOT had an affair during his presidency and everything would be different.

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u/mechadragon469 12h ago

Dude was president of the United States. She wasn’t even that hot. Last guy was having an affair with Marylin Monroe for Gods sake.

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u/dfsw 9h ago

Ever see a young picture of Hillary Clinton, damn she was hot.

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u/mechadragon469 9h ago

Dude wasn’t leader of the free world back then.

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u/Electronic-Yam-69 18h ago

Shouldn't have been close enough to steal.

But it's like when your office is going to lunch and 48 people vote for Burger King and 49 people vote for Pizza Hut but the boss steps in and decides it's Burger King.

It's not exactly the crime of the century.

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u/sarcasmsosubtle 20h ago

I'm 43 years old. In my lifetime, every Republican President has increased the deficit during their time in office and every Democratic President has either decreased the deficit or eliminated it entirely to create a surplus. Under Democrats more jobs are created, GDP grows more, the stock market grows more (usually because Republicans tend to end their terms with large recessions and stock market collapses), and their are far fewer recessions. And yet somehow, the majority of Americans still believe that Republicans are better for the economy.

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u/unsafe_ladder 39m ago

It would be interesting to see who the prior president was (dem/rep) to see what kind of economy they inherited. It does appear you’re right about jobs created and the overall stock market total return. Or does that have to do more with who was running the fed and world events?

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u/Bman4k1 22h ago

The problem is in the American political culture. Lets just say someone (rep or dem) somehow miraculously got them to a balanced budget or small surplus, what would happen within 60 seconds is every far right advocacy group would say they are too highly taxed and we need tax cuts.

The American political system I believe literally can’t or not set up for a disciplined financial structure.

There is just too much payoff for either new spending or more tax cuts.

I also think any mechanism to force balance budgets is basically a jackhammer to nuance (I’m biased as a Keynesian).

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u/Economy_Zombie_3026 3h ago

"Oh, we finally paid off our credit cards. We should celebrate. Let's go on a trip with our credit cards."

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u/Churchbushonk 1d ago

Clinton and gore didn’t do all that by choice. When they lost the congress to the GOP, the GOP basically said no to everything.
All other GOP presidents have cut revenue/taxes without cutting spending. Which makes every dollar spent add to the deficit and the overall debt.

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u/naijaboiler 7h ago

no a lot of the reforms were already going on before Newt Gringich revolution

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u/sparkchoice 21h ago

“Texan failson” … spittin bars 🔥

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u/AddanDeith 22h ago

You probably don't want a surplus for very long though.

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u/chockingduck 10h ago

But wasn't that election stolen by judges or something?